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New Year’s at Baguio – Mines View and More

Let’s say I get all pilosopo (Filipino for… smart-aleck? Can’t exactly translate again) and ask, why is the place called Mines View when there are no obvious mines on sight? You’d want to slap me, right? It’s because the place is just astonishing, questions like those are rendered irrelevant.

It takes a walk to get to the view itself if you get off the main road, though, so you bet there’ll be hoards of vendors hawking their wares! This I was glad to see though – an abundance of vendors selling corn (not on the cob! Yay!) with heaps of cheese powder and butter (okay, cheap margarine). I was addicted to this during college in Manila, and it disappointed me that fewer and fewer sell these in Manila. But NOT HERE IN BAGUIO! I was so happy, I ate three in one day! 😀

There was also about three of these kinds of booths – the ones with big St. Bernards you can take a picture with for a low price. What saddened me more than how cute I found the dogs, however, is how their “owners”/caretakers “took care” of them. This one was the worst! The dog was obviously tired and wanted to sleep, but the guy kept dragging him around by the cuff of his neck and kept smoking near him when there weren’t any customers. 😦 My mom added as well that while them having those glasses on are cute, it could actually blind them as they have been wearing them for so long. I’m not a fierce animal advocate by any means, but this sickened me. Can something like this for the sake of entertainment stop, and better care be taken of these dogs?!

Ranting aside, we finally got there! Nature (mostly) untouched at its finest. They even have binoculars rentals for P5, LOL. Hint for ya: don’t wear shoes or boots without grip in the bottom when going around Baguio. Learned this the hard way while at Mines View! Anyway, the last time I was at Mines View was when I was a toddler – so this was practically like a first-time visit for me!

As we came out of Mines View, three of the Luna kids were already perched up this small hill, with all the rich kids and spoiled brats (judgmental much? Ahaha) down there looking in envy and telling their moms, “Mommy, I want, too!” Being the sheltered kids they are, the moms disagreed, of course. LOL that aside, look at how much fun they had. This gives me an album-cover vibe, what do you think? 😀

If you’re a fan of jams, you have to go visit Good Shepherd, which is a walk away from the Mines View entrance/exit. Their strawberry jam and ube jam, while I’m not exactly a fan of, are excellently made – no wonder it’s practically a cult favorite!

Next up: Baguio Botanical Garden! I was pretty excited to get here and shoot, but two things: it rained, and the place was under construction so it wasn’t as pretty and picturesque as it should be. Bummer. Make the most of it though, yeah?

Acorn! This made me think of that character in the Ice Age movies (squirrel, was it? Maybe not.) obsessed with acorns LOL.

Next up: a place in Baguio none of us have ever been too, Tam-Awan Village, supposed to be a “garden in the sky”, and main attraction being that it’s supposed to feature actual old houses of the Ilocanos. Cool, right?

Unfortunately, this was the only thing closest to “Ilocano house” that we saw. Can I just tell you, the whole thing’s actually just a climb up through Mother Nature itself…

…slippery mud roads, sharp rocks and everything! Bad for me and my no-grip booties that day! In my opinion, the only thing cool about this place was the mountain air itself. If you’re a nature tripper, then by all means visit this! Not for me, though.

To make matters worse that day, Mom and I had another of our many fights – can you see her shooting daggers at me through this photo and Dad keeping that peace-keeper face? 😀

Okay, Tam-Awan Village isn’t just for nature-trippers – for the art people as well! This exhibit was supposed to be by someone famous, but I didn’t catch the name. Look at how cool those strings in the artwork are, though! IMO, they felt like guitar strings. That’s all my non-arty self can say about these! 😀

The ‘rents then decided this would be a good place to shoot our family portraits. Leavin’ you with smiles on our beautiful faces (LOL), more on Baguio to come!